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By Megan Rauscher
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) Nov 09 - In the treatment of carpal tunnel syndrome, decompression surgery produces a better long-term outcome than local corticosteroid injections, according to data presented at the American College of Rheumatology meeting in Boston this week.
Dr. Domingo Ly-Pen, of Centro de Salud Gandhi, Madrid, reported outcomes, after a median of 5.9 years, for 148 of 163 wrists randomized to surgery or local steroid injection.
At 1 year, the results showed that local corticosteroid injection was as effective as decompression surgery, Dr. Ly-Pen and colleagues report in a meeting abstract.
However, at 7 years, the estimated accumulated incidence of therapeutic failure in the corticosteroid group was 41.8% compared with 11.6% in the surgery group.
The long-term data are not all that surprising, Dr. Ly-Pen told Reuters Health, explaining that \"the effects of corticosteroid injections fade with time.\"
He emphasized, however, that corticosteroid injections do have a role in the treatment of carpal tunnel syndrome. \"It does seem that surgery is better in the long term, but a lot of patients with carpal tunnel syndrome do not want to have surgery,\" Dr. Ly-Pen said.
He also noted that \"in our study, almost half of the patients initially injected with corticosteroids did not need any additional treatment in the 7 years follow-up.\" |
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